While the radio industry has been vociferous in its negative reaction to widespread job cuts in the programming and on-air realms at the nation’s No. 1 owner of AM and FM stations, Wall Street has sung a different tune.
The slicing of employee salary and benefits at a company with $5.75 billion in debt is perhaps a good thing. As such, iHeartMedia stock is at a post-bankruptcy high.
As of 10:55am Pacific Wednesday, IHRT was trading at $18.18, up 22 cents from Tuesday’s close.
It’s the latest rise for a stock that closed at $14.56 on December 12, and hasn’t dipped since.
In fact, this stock price elevation greatly bests that seen in November 2019, when iHeart peaked at $16.37 to end a five-month malaise for the company’s stock.
That included a $12.87 finish on Aug. 9, 2019.
At present, IHRT has a 1-year target estimate of $20. Short-term and mid-term analysts views are positive, signaling a good investment opportunity.
Meanwhile, the names of those impacted by iHeart’s widespread job losses continues to grow. On Monday Steve Kramer went to Facebook to tell listeners that he was no longer hosting the morning show on CHR/Pop KHTS “Channel 93.3” in San Diego.
It is now known that iHeart is bringing back “Geena The Latina” and “Frankie V” for the wake-up slot. They previously held the KHTS morning shot from 2010-2015.
In Florida, former WMTX/Tampa PD Randi West was hired by Hubbard Radio to program top-rated WRMF-FM and CHR/Pop translator “Party 96.3” in West Palm Beach.
And, in Oklahoma City, Bill Reed has been hired by Champlin Broadcasting to host afternoons at Class C2 Country Gold KNAH-FM “99.7 Hank FM.” Reed was PD/morning host at iHeart’s Country KXXY-FM in the market, and had been with the station for 25 years.
